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Jeff Ragan

http://jeffragan.blogspot.com/

Jeff’s Bookshelves

to-read‎ (80)
currently-reading‎ (85)
read‎ (361)
did-not-finish‎ (0)
religion‎ (53)
fiction‎ (14)
history‎ (12)
adventure‎ (11)
fiction-youth‎ (7)
mountaineering‎ (6)
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literature‎ (5)

education-christian‎ (4)
poetry‎ (4)
christianity-theology‎ (3)
junior-fiction‎ (3)
religion-prayer‎ (3)
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biblical-commentary‎ (2)
christianity-evangelism‎ (2)
christianity-prayer‎ (2)
economics‎ (2)
religion-theology‎ (2)
adventure-childrens‎ (1)

adventure-sailing-mountaineering‎ (1)
american-indians‎ (1)
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christianity-living-simplicity‎ (1)
christianity-marriage‎ (1)
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christianity-psychology‎ (1)
christianity-theology-heresy‎ (1)
christmas‎ (1)
communication‎ (1)
conrad-hilton-hospitality‎ (1)
economics-macroeconomics‎ (1)

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Jeff is Currently Reading

Jeff Ragan is currently reading

Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life, Study Guide

by Donald S. Whitney

bookshelves: currently-reading

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progress:

(page 135 of 144)
""Age and experience by themselves don't increase your spiritual maturity. Becoming like Jesus doesn't happen incidentally or automatically with the passing of birthdays. Godliness, as 1 Timothy 4:7 says, requires a deliberate discipline. The Discipline of learning transforms accidental learners into intentional learners" (127-8)." — Jul 29, 2026 11:38AM

Jul 01, 2026 10:15AM

Jeff Ragan is currently reading

Wildfire (Kelly Turnbull/PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC)

by Kurt Schlichter (Goodreads Author)

bookshelves: currently-reading

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(page 208 of 320)
""'Diversity is strength,' Carter said, fuming. Turnbull, as he clenched his fist in irritation, observed that despite the Split, some Americans still retained their natural inclination to tell other people how they should live. 'Does Germany look strong to you, fraulein?' the mayor replied" (201)." — Jul 27, 2026 10:43AM

Jun 01, 2026 07:00AM

Jeff Ragan is currently reading

The Story of Civilization, Volume 2: The Life of Greece

by Will Durant

bookshelves: currently-reading

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progress:

(page 524 of 754)
""When liberty becomes license, dictatorship is near. The rich, afraid that democracy will bleed them, conspire to overthrow it; or some enterprising individual seizes power, promises everything to the poor, surrounds himself with a personal army, kills first his enemies and then his friends 'until he has made a purgation of the state,' and establishes a dictatorship" (520)." — Jul 29, 2026 11:33AM

Jul 28, 2025 11:05AM

See all 85 books that Jeff is reading…

Jeff’s Quotes

“If a mistake is made the honorable thing to do is to own up to it.' Of course I was talking about Levi owning up to his mistakes. But as I finish this book, I realize it applies equally to myself, and to all of us as we try but fail to live up to the standards we know are right. Our inability and unwillingness to keep the standards don't make the standards any less valuable and good.”
― Bristol Palin, Not Afraid of Life: My Journey So Far

tags: personal-responsibility

19 likes

“Visiting America in the early nineteenth century, Alexis de Tocqueville observd that 'the sects that exist in the United States are innumerable,' and yet 'all sects preach the same moral law in the name of God.' Tocqueville termed religion the first of America's political institutions, which means that it had a profoundly public effect in regulating morality and mores throughout the society. And he saw Christianity as countering the powerful human instincts of selfishness and ambition by holding out an ideal of charity and devotion to the welfare of others.”
― Dinesh D'Souza, What's So Great About Christianity

4 likes

“Reading is escape, and the opposite of escape; it's a way to make contact with reality after a day of making things up, and it's a way of making contact with someone else's imagination after a day that's all too real.”
― Nora Ephron

tags: reading

4551 likes

“...capitalism satisfied the Christian demand for an institution that channels selfish human desire toward the betterment of society. Some critics accuse capitalism of being a selfish system, but the selfishness is not in capitalism - it is in human nature.”
― Dinesh D'Souza, What's So Great About Christianity

tags: capitalism, christianity, greed

8 likes

“I now want to examine a second major feature of Western civilization that derives from Christianity. This is what philosopher Charles Taylor calls the 'affirmation of ordinary life.' It is the simple idea that ordinary people are fallible, and yet these fallible people matter. In this view, society should organize itself in order to meet their everyday concerns, which are elevated into a kind of spiritual framework. The nuclear family, the idea of limited government, the Western concept of the rule of law, and our culture's high emphasis on the relief of suffering all derive from this basic Christian understanding of the dignity of fallible human beings.”
― Dinesh D'Souza, What's So Great About Christianity

tags: christianity, human-rights

7 likes

More of Jeff’s quotes…